Infectious Diseases and Toxicology - PDF

6. Breakdown of public health - e.g., the Infectious and emergent diseases still kill current situation millions of in Zimbabwe people. A wide variety of pathogens afflict humans, 7. Poverty and social inequality - e.g., including...

6. Breakdown of public health - e.g., the Infectious and emergent diseases still kill current situation millions of in Zimbabwe people. A wide variety of pathogens afflict humans, 7. Poverty and social inequality - e.g., including tuberculosis is viruses, bacteria, protozoans, parasitic primarily a problem in low- income areas worms, and 8. War and famine – e.g., Gulf war, Ukraine flukes. war Diarrhea, acute respiratory illnesses, 9. Bioterrorism - e.g., 2001 Anthrax attacks malaria, measles, 10.Dam and irrigation system construction - tetanus, kill about 11 million children under e.g., malaria age 5 every and other mosquito borne disease year in the developing world. Better nutrition, clean water, improved ECOLOGICAL EPIDEMIOLOGY sanitation, and Study of the ecology of infectious diseases inexpensive inoculations could eliminate Includes population and community-level most deaths. studies of the interactions between hosts and their Factors Contributing to Disease pathogens and Emergence: parasites and covers diseases of both 1. Microbial adaptation - e.g., genetic drift humans and Wildlife and genetic shift Ebola hemorrhagic fever kills up to 90% of in Influenza A its human victims. 2. Changing human susceptibility - e.g., Chronic wasting disease CWD (caused by mass prions) is immunocompromising with HIV/AIDS irreversible, degenerative neurological 3. Climate and weather - e.g., diseases with diseases known zoonotic as transmissible spongiform vectors such as West Nile Disease encephalopathies (TSE) (transmitted by that include mad cow disease in cattle, mosquitoes) are moving further from the scrapie in tropics as the climate is warm. sheep, and Creutzfeldt-Jacob disease in 4. Change in human demographics and humans trade - e.g., rapid Tropical diseases, such as malaria, travel enabled COVID to rapidly propagate cholera, yellow around the fever, and dengue fever are moving into globe areas from 5. Economic development - e.g., use of which they were formerly absent as antibiotics to mosquitoes, increase meat yield of farmed cows leads to rodents, and other vectors expand into new antibiotic habitat resistance Resistance to Drugs, Antibiotics, and Pesticides The protozoan parasite that causes malaria is now resistant to most drugs, while the mosquitoes that transmit it has developed resistance to many insecticides. The following are the reasons for antibiotic resistance to develop - Antibiotics do not work against certain diseases, e.g., viral infections. ECOTOXICOLOGY -study of toxins (poisons) and their effects, particularly on living systems because many substances are known to be poisonous to life (whether plant, animal, or microbial). -toxin’s damage or kill living organisms because they react with cellular components to disrupt metabolic functions. EFFECTS OF TOXINS Allergens - immune- activating agents Allergens act as antigens directly; that is, white blood cells recognize them as foreign and stimulate the production of specific antibodies.